Keeping a Secret
by Mara O
Summary: Methos was being a little sarcastic when Duncan asked him how long it had been since his last challenge. How can you be a Watcher and avoid immortals? How can you fight as a Watcher and not get caught?


A Haiku:

No money made here  
I have so few posessions  
Lawsuit not worth it.

* * *

"How long has it been since you've had to defend yourself?" asked Duncan MacLeod, a little too insistently for his companion's liking.

Methos sighed inwardly. This guy was far too nosy for his own good, and the hero-worship was definitely starting to wear thin. "Let's see, what are we…6th of March?" Methos said a little sarcastically. "That would make it…200 years."

MacLeod's jaw dropped, and Methos smiled. Let the Highlander think he was vulnerable, that somehow he'd lasted for five millennia on luck alone. Methos had agreed with Sun Tzu on many things, including the merits of appearing weaker than you were.

* * *

Her assignment stopped in the middle of the darkened street and for a moment Annie Coburn, Watcher, feared that she'd been spotted. She let out a silent sigh when he began to turn slowly, his hand sliding under his long coat. He'd gotten wind of another Immortal, not her.

"I am Josef Bauer," her assignment called out, "and I want your head!" _Headhunting bastard,_ thought Annie.

They both heard an answering sound – steel leaving scabbard. A voice followed after it: "Funny, I want my head too," the other Immortal said. Annie couldn't see him yet, but she suspected that the voice was coming from around the corner of the large brick building. "I'm in no mood to lose it today, so if you want to keep yours I suggest you move on."

Annie's eyes widened in surprise. That voice…there was no mistaking it! It sounded just like…

Adam Pierson rounded the corner, sword in hand. Annie had to hold her hand over her mouth to keep from crying out. Adam! Adam, her fellow Watcher! _Oh god!_

She debated running away for a split second. The correct thing to do would be to go back to headquarters and report Adam as an Immortal.

_But would that be the _right_ thing to do?_ She _knew_ Adam. He'd been called up from research last month to assist her in piecing together her assignment's long and complicated chronicles. She considered them friends, as much as someone she'd only seen at work could be considered a friend. And now her friend was ducking sword blows in a dark alley. He didn't seem to be enjoying it either…in fact, he seemed – she winced at the pun – very much on edge. No, she decided, unlike Bauer, Adam was no cold-blooded killer. He'd given her assignment the chance to leave, and stood his ground nobly when that chance was refused. The least courtesy she could show him was to wait, observe, and let him make his own plans.

Well, at the moment, his plans seemed to include 'lose this fight.' Annie cringed as Adam took a glancing blow to the stomach and fell to his knees. _Oh god, no…_ She couldn't watch, but she knew she had to. Just as her assignment raised his sword high, however, Adam flopped over onto his back and scissored his legs with the other Immortal's. Her assignment went down, and Adam lashed out wildly with his sword. It was over.

Annie gasped as the first bolt of blue lightning struck her friend. She'd seen a few Quickenings before, but not so many that the wonder and the spectacle had worn off. And when it was Adam receiving it…she feared for him, even through she knew it wouldn't last.

When it was over, and Adam had fallen to his knees, exhausted, she wondered what she could possibly do. She supposed she could always report an 'unknown' challenger, but that would be a lie. She knew exactly who the other Immortal was. She wondered how he had managed to escape notice up till now. She wasn't entirely sure, but at first blush she didn't think he could have become Immortal too recently; except for that one mistake, he was just too…well, maybe not _good_ exactly, but too experienced. He definitely knew what he was doing. Unless of course he'd just happened to have taken fencing lessons as a child.

_Oh, god, he's getting up…_

Confront him, or just let it go? Walk away and pretend it never happened? Tell him that she'd seen him? Now? Later? Expose him at work? Too many decisions…

And no time to make them in. Adam was now shakily getting to his feet and sheathing his sword. Beginning to walk. Towards Annie. _No, _she decided, _I won't lie to him._ She stood up from behind her hiding place and started walking towards him

"Adam!"

He whipped around, then froze as he recognized her. "Annie? What are you doing here?" She'd gotten close enough to see him roll his eyes as he realized the answer. "Right, observing and recording. So…" He left the sentence open for her.

"So, how long have you…"

"Been interfering?" he joked. He tried to smile disarmingly, but Annie could see that he seemed to be sizing her up, seeing her in a new light. He looked at the ground and shook his head ever-so-slightly, then sighed and said, "I got recruited into the Watchers years ago because some ruddy great idiot comes swinging at me with a sword. I got away and nobody seemed to question why_ me_ , but I did a little digging anyway. It turns out that some Immortals can actually sense those who have the potential to become Immortal, and some of those select few target pre-Immortals exclusively, looking for an easy kill." He seemed to shudder, the collected himself enough to shrug. "I fell rock-climbing the summer after I finished training. It all seemed so ironic at the time."

_So it was recent,_ Annie mused. _Poor thing…_

"Annie," Adam began, looking straight into her eyes with a sorrowful expression, "I am sorry that you're in this position, but…"

"No, I understand," she cut him off. "I don't need an explanation." She noted that he looked slightly relieved. "However, I do need to know what you want to do about this."

Adam seemed a little flustered. "You're the first one to catch me. I don't know what to do." His eyes were wide, pleading her not to turn him in.

"I don't want to have to start a chronicle on you," Annie said. "I'd have to stop talking to you. I'd only know if you were alive or dead by some glib comment over the water cooler the next morning." _And I don't want that._

He grinned. "Annie, no matter what, Adam Pierson is first and foremost a Watcher. I'll keep being one until…well, I guess until they start making Dorian Grey jokes." He took her hand, surprising her. "Thank you for letting me keep my life."

Annie smiled at him, wondering exactly when she had made the decision not to report him. Shrugging, she said, "No problem."

* * *

_That,_ thought Methos later,_ was one of my more clever tricks if I do say so myself. _He grinned in self-congratulation. _Instead of just running from that bastard, I've got my safety net in place. After all, as long as _somebody_ thinks that Adam Pierson is a recent Immortal, nobody will expect him to be 5,000, now will they? And Annie's a stand-up kind of girl, and I didn't technically lie to her. My secret is safe for now._


End file.
